Дэвид Балдаччи - End Game

“I am. And I could have done the same thing at twice the distance. Only next time I won’t be aiming at rubber.” She put her hand through the bars and stabbed her finger into his forehead. “It’ll hit right here.”

“Then I understand you loud and clear, ma’am.”

“It’s so flat out here it’s hard to believe the Rockies are right behind us,” said Reel as they drove to Blue Man’s childhood home.

“It’s hard to believe lots of things,” replied Robie. “Who would have gotten those two idiots to try to scare us off?”

“Half the people we’ve already met,” answered Reel. “Doctor King and his minions for one. Then the white supremacists that we haven’t met yet. Or the skinheads. Hell, Malloy and her deputy for all we know. The point is, Robie, we don’t understand this place or what went on before here. And we probably never will. Blue Man could have disappeared because of some shit that took place when he was growing up here.”

“Don’t tell me you’re buying that crap Donovan was spinning about Blue Man killing his parents and then somebody here coming after him for it?”

“Of course not!”

“Well then?”

“I just mean we don’t know this place. We’re flying blind. That’s never a good thing.”

“Still doesn’t excuse us from finding him,” said Robie.

“Never said it did. I just mean we need more intelligence.”

“We’re gathering intelligence every time we talk to someone.”

“But we have no way of knowing if they’re telling us the truth or not. When I’m prepping a shot I can do my wind call and my distance read and all the other factors that go into determining whether the shot will be successful or not. But my tools don’t lie to me. They give me the facts. This is different. Way different.”

“Still not an excuse. We have our mission. We have our orders. We just need to adapt and execute.”

Reel shot him a glance. “Okay, how do we adapt?”

“We’re both good observers, Jess. We listen and we hear everything, not just the bullshit. We can read body language, because our job requires us to be able to do that. So we employ all of that while we’re here.”

Reel turned her attention back to the road. “Okay, what’s your take on Malloy and Bender?”

He glanced at her. “Still distrusting the local constabulary? Didn’t your good ‘Doctor’ King give them a clean bill?”

“Like you said, we don’t know him.”

“Okay. Malloy hasn’t been here long enough to really be part of this place. Bender on the other hand has. And so have his sister and their mother. I’m not saying they had anything to do with Blue Man vanishing. But I’m also not saying that everything they told us was the truth. The guy that confronted me in the bar, Bruce? I take him as someone with no future who found one with this Doctor King. And what’s your take on him ? You said he struck you more as a lawyer type.”

Reel didn’t answer right away. She gripped the steering wheel, her face lined in deliberation.

“He’s smooth but not psycho smooth. The guy appears to be leading some wacko cult, but he didn’t come across as that sort. Tough one to figure out. He said he had nothing to do with Blue Man disappearing. Same as what his ‘apostle’ told you. And I think I believe him. Just my gut.”

“Sure you’re not just falling under his spell?” asked Robie in a joking manner.

She shot him another glance. “Hook, line, and sinker of course,” she replied with an eye roll tacked on.

He looked away. “There’s something that somebody said that didn’t make sense.”

“Like what?”

“I don’t know. But it’s like grit in your barrel. It’s throwing everything off.”

“Well, think hard and come up with it.”

He closed his eyes and leaned back in his seat.

Reel looked at him once, and her features softened and a look of uncertainty came into her eyes. Then she glanced away and concentrated on her driving. As she eyed the twin holes in the windshield, she had no idea if another pair of rounds might be heading toward them. And this time they might not strike simply leather.

It was small, squat, and devoid of any architectural detail of interest.

The inauspicious childhood home of Blue Man.

Robie and Reel stood next to their truck and stared at the structure.

“Oh, how the lowly have risen,” said Robie.

“I just always assumed Blue Man was born into a family of academics on an Ivy League campus,” offered Reel.

“Well, like you said before, we don’t really know the man that well.”

“Who really knows anybody these days?” countered Reel.

“You got that right,” retorted Robie, drawing a quick stare from Reel. But he wasn’t looking at her.

He walked over to the single-car garage and peered through the window. The garage was now empty. “I would imagine they took the car away when they investigated the deaths.” He shook his head. “I can’t imagine coming home and finding my parents dead by their own hand.”

“It might explain why Blue Man never married.”

“He wanted to marry Claire,” Robie pointed out.

“True.”

The front door was locked. Robie took out her pick tools and it no longer was.

“He left the furniture,” noted Robie.

The front room had a couch, two chairs, and a battered coffee table.

They passed through into the kitchen. Plates and glasses were still in cabinets. A framed picture of the Rocky Mountains was on one wall.

Robie tried the kitchen faucet and water came out. “They have to be on a well. No water lines out here. Septic, too. Looks fresh and clean. He’s probably paid someone to maintain it all.”

He tried a light switch. It came on. “Place has juice, too.”

“So he must be paying the utility bill.”

Robie opened the door to the garage, and both gazed at the spot where the car would have been with the two dead people inside it.

Robie glanced at Reel, but she didn’t look at him.

They took the stairs up and encountered one bathroom. The fixtures were all from decades ago but the sink and toilet worked.

One bedroom they entered had a bed and an empty closet.

“He obviously cleaned out their closets,” observed Robie.

“And no pictures on the walls or furniture. He must have taken those, too.”

There was only one other bedroom up here. The bed was still in this one, too. And under the bed was a large wooden box.

Robie slid it out, put it on the bed, and opened it. He took out a number of faded athletic trophies and frayed first-place ribbons.

They all had Roger Walton’s name on them.

“He was a high school sports star,” noted Robie.

Reel looked over the items with amazement. “I just thought he was this big brain. I never saw him as an athlete.”

There was a scrapbook in the box. Reel lifted it out and opened it.

On the yellowed pages was basically a chronicle of a youthful Roger Walton’s achievements in Grand, Colorado.

“He made the local paper a lot,” noted Robie. “For sports. And he was high school valedictorian and the damn prom king. He captained the debate team. And this clip is about him accepting a full ride to Stanford.”

“It’s a wonder he had time to sleep,” observed Reel.

“I don’t think he sleeps as an adult,” replied Robie.

“Why do you think he left all this stuff behind?”

“I’m no shrink, but maybe it has something to do with preserving his life here. I mean, the one he has in DC couldn’t be more different from what he has here. Maybe he uses it to balance his life out. Probably why he keeps coming back. To his roots.”

“Robie, he never talked about his life here. Even the DCI didn’t know about this stuff. It would have been in the briefing book.”